205 comments:

My niece knows 7 languages and is learning German. ("May be then I will teach you some German too") She hasn't expressed a real political opinion yet......some people sit and bitch, others stand up and do......

The angry white person party Circa 1900 another excerpt from "The Bully Pulpit" by Doris Kearns Goodwin:

"...In addition, southern Republicans had never forgiven Roosevelt for the unprecedented dinner invitation extended the previous fall to the black educator Booker T. Washington. At the time, the vehement reaction in the South had stunned and saddened Roosevelt. Newspaper editorials throughout the region decried the president's attempt to make a black man the social equal of a white man by sharing the same dinner table. "Social equality with the Negro means decadence and damnation," announced one southern official. "The action of President Roosevelt in entertaining that nigger will necessitate our killing a thousand niggers in the South before they will learn their place," declared South Carolina's Benn Tillman." "The Bully Pulpit", Doris Kearns Goodwin, Blithedale Producitons, Inc. 2013

Look at his policies. Look at where he gets his money. Heck, he was against US foreign intervention until he could actually do something about it. He was against gay marriage until the 2012 election was a couple months away.

He's not going to rock the boat. He is living the high life and loving every minute of it. He is the personification of the angry white dude (if one takes the time to look).

Defining "epithet" will be the problem. Is "motherfucker" an epithet or a crude Freudian allusion? Is "cocksucker" homophobic when gender specific? Hmm...Free speech does have limits as posited by Mister Justice Holmes, but what are they? Are politicians the best judges? For example, Senator McCain thinks that any negative criticism directed at him goes beyond the pale. Why, he even got enough Congressmen and a Supreme Court justice to agree.

Teresita RedingerTue Jan 28, 12:17:00 PM ESTThe Knesset took the first step toward creating legislation that would ban the use of the word "Nazi" as an epithet. That will make the discussion around here a little nicer when WiO is reined in.

Dear Ms T,

"will make the discussion around here a little nicer when WiO is reined in"

Don't make anti-Semitic remarks, don't trash Judaism, don't throw slurs like "YID" or "Hooked Nose" or advocate one standard for Jews or Israel and no standards for others.

California has long been the flagship for Obamacare. It was targeted last fall by President Barack Obama's own activist group, Organizing for Action, for precisely that reason: given the strength of their volunteer efforts, they hoped the state could be a symbol for the success of Obamacare as a whole.

That is one reason that there is so much loud cheering by the media's left-wing commentators every time Covered California, the state's Obamacare program, announces that it has achieved something, no matter how modest--or how exaggerated.

Yet many of Covered California's "successes" are only relative to the failure of the program as a whole, and most of them are overblown. For example, on the day Obamacare enrollment started, Covered California reported that it had received 5 million web hits. In fact, however, it had received only 645,000--roughly 10% of what was initially reported.

The latest version of such inflation is Covered California's jubilant announcement last week that "500,108 Californians enrolled for health insurance and selected plans through the end of 2013."That was cause for jubilation by Ezra Klein--from the start, one of Obamcare's chief media pitchmen--and Evan Soltas in the Washington Post, who celebrated California's achievement of "424,396" enrollments. As John McCormack of the Weekly Standard notes, Klein and Soltas are only counting those eligible for Obamacare subsidies, not the total number who enrolled. But there is a further problem: California refuses to say, or cannot say, how many of those have actually paid for their insurance, meaning we do not know the actual number.

It gets worse--much worse. By the end of October, the executive director of California's Obamacare exchange confirmed that up to 900,000 people in the state would lose their current health insurance by the end of 2013--not including those who may lose it through their workplaces in 2014. Many of those are among the 500,000 or so who signed up for Obamacare through Covered California by the end of 2013--about 330,000, according to McCormack. That also means that only about 200,000 previously uninsured people signed up for Obamacare.

As for the other 600,000 or so, no one know what happened to them--they are just uninsured. The state refused to participate in President Barack Obama's proposed "fix" for those who had their policies canceled.

So roughly three times as many people have lost insurance as have gained it. That is what the left now defines as "success." The rest of the country is presumably meant to take heart from the fact that California's performance highlights the best-case scenario for Obamacare. And there are other problems--a boycott by Calfornia doctors, for one.

Klein and Soltas at least have the presence of mind not to go as far as Covered California and claim 1.2 million people in the state signed up for expanded Medicaid through Obamacare. Half of those were simply transferred into the program by bureaucrats, and the other half signed up for Medi-Cal during the period of Obamacare enrollment, but not necessarily because of it.

Covered California claims its numbers show "continued vigor in the new insurance marketplace." Much more of such "vigor," and the state's insurance industry will be dead.

Cancer-stricken Sen. Tom Coburn revealed Tuesday that his health insurance under Obamacare doesn’t cover his oncologist, but said he still is receiving excellent care.

“I’m doing well from a health standpoint, got great docs,” Coburn said on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” on Tuesday when asked about his health. “Fortunately — even though my new coverage won’t cover my specialist — I’m going to have great care, and I have a great prognosis.”

The Oklahoma Republican’s spokesman confirmed to POLITICO that since the senator enrolled in his health insurance plan under Obamacare, his coverage has been reduced and he lost coverage for his cancer specialist. Coburn will continue to pay out of pocket and see his oncologist, his office said.

(Also on POLITICO: Keating won't seek Coburn's seat)

Coburn made public in November that he had been diagnosed with a recurrence of prostate cancer. He also had prostate cancer surgery in 2011 and has survived colon cancer and melanoma. He also announced earlier this month he would not serve out his full Senate term, but said his decision was not made because of his health.

The Oklahoma Republican and physician has been a critic of Obamacare, unveiling on Monday a plan with two other senators to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act.

“The toilet flushes muddy water, there is no hot water, the shower floor is covered in dirt and mud, there was p--- all over the toilet, the water is undrinkable (it’s brown), it’s even sketchy to brush your teeth in it, and the idea of having internet in this place is a joke.”

Welcome to The Province! We're noticing a lot of visitors from Reddit and Drudge Report today. Here are some other recent stories you might be interested in:

Mayor claims there are no gay people in Sochi

Is it safe to eat the sushi? Answers to your questions about Fukushima radiation

How to speak Canadian: 9 terms that confuse the English-speaking world

But the post, that went on to describe troubles with getting his accreditation, negative descriptions of the resort and worrying disputes over payment for the work he and five others were flown to Sochi to do, disappeared from his blog the next day.

“I’ve been told to shut up,” Balfour was quoted as saying in The Australian newspaper on Friday.

The blog was captured before it was deleted and posted to the alpinezone.com online forum.

His musical career was always braided tightly with his political activism, in which he advocated for causes ranging from civil rights to the cleanup of his beloved Hudson River. Seeger said he left the Communist Party around 1950 and later renounced it. But the association dogged him for years.

He was kept off commercial television for more than a decade after tangling with the House Un-American Activities Committee in 1955. Repeatedly pressed by the committee to reveal whether he had sung for Communists, Seeger responded sharply: “I love my country very dearly, and I greatly resent this implication that some of the places that I have sung and some of the people that I have known, and some of my opinions, whether they are religious or philosophical, or I might be a vegetarian, make me any less of an American.”

He was charged with contempt of Congress, but the sentence was overturned on appeal.

Seeger called the 1950s, years when he was denied broadcast exposure, the high point of his career. He was on the road touring college campuses, spreading the music he, Guthrie, Huddie “Lead Belly” Ledbetter and others had created or preserved.

“The most important job I did was go from college to college to college to college, one after the other, usually small ones,” he told The Associated Press in 2006. ” … And I showed the kids there’s a lot of great music in this country they never played on the radio.”

His scheduled return to commercial network television on the highly rated Smothers Brothers variety show in 1967 was hailed as a nail in the coffin of the blacklist. But CBS cut out his Vietnam protest song, Waist Deep in the Big Muddy, and Seeger accused the network of censorship.

q is out in Gary, Indiana, fighting 200 demons in a house where a little boy was walking up the wall backwards, and on the ceiling too, according to police, a psychologist, and a family counselor/social worker, who witnessed the incident.

The mother had been exorcised previously four times but it didn't take.

q says he must remove the demons before he can properly work on mom and son.

Further details again tomorrow on Fox News - The O'Reilly Factor.......

It's possible the demons may "have come in from the cold" so to speak......

There are a lot of false exorcists plying a limited market out there these days, some using Skype even......it's good to know a real pro is on the scene now......

"“The toilet flushes muddy water, there is no hot water, the shower floor is covered in dirt and mud, there was p--- all over the toilet, the water is undrinkable (it’s brown), it’s even sketchy to brush your teeth in it, and the idea of having internet in this place is a joke.”"

January 28, 2014 Obama Has Made it Impossible for Israel to Strike IranBy Karin McQuillan

I called a hardheaded realist, a Harvard trained PhD who has been watching the Middle East professionally for decades, to ask him about Obama's Iran deal. This is what he told me.

It's done. Iran will get a bomb.

They want a bomb and they will not be denied unless somebody stops them. Obama does not want to stop them. He does not want a friendly regime in Iran. He wants Iran as a counterforce to America and Israel. Obama is not a Muslim, but he is a radical. He sees the U.S. and Israel as imperialistic and oppressive. He doesn't like the U.S. military. He'd cut it to nothing if he could get away with it.

We'll have to pull our troops and our aircraft carriers out of the Persian Gulf. We'll lose our ability to protect Middle Eastern oil. The Gulf Arabs will have to cooperate with Iran. So will Europe; they depend on that oil.

The Iranians want the ascendance of Shia Islam. People don't remember, but when Ayatollah Khomeini took over, he sent Revolutionary Guards to Saudi Arabia and they seized Mecca. French paratroopers had to go in secretly and get them out. The Saudis couldn't do it themselves.

The Iranians want to take over Mecca and Medina. They want to take over the Arab world. With their nuclear weapons they will pressure Israel. They don't need to bomb them. They will test a nuclear bomb, they will send in missiles, they will issue threats, they will strangle them economically. Israel's high tech people will leave. They can do start-ups in Silicon Valley just as easily as in Israel; the weather is just as nice. Investments in Israel will dry up.

The deal is indeed terrible. Obama has been changing the rules of the game -- he went from Iran not having the ability to make a bomb, which had been our policy, to Iran not actually making a complete bomb.

Once you've mastered enrichment, and Iran has, creating enough highly enriched uranium is just a choice; there are no technical hurdles left. They have thousands of centrifuges that can enrich uranium in a few months, starting from zero. Whether they have stocks on hand enriched to 5% or 20% is totally irrelevant.

Iran will have an unarmed bomb on the shelf ready to go. Loading the bomb takes a short time -- who will know when they do that? Bombs are not that big, especially ones meant to be loaded on missiles. So who will even know where it is?

The Threat to America

Forget a dirty bomb against America. What about a real bomb? A ten thousand pound bomb could be on a cargo ship or a barge heading into an American port. There are many points of failure in trying to stop them. We do radiation testing on cargo ships, as much as we can. Iranians are smart, they have good engineers and scientists, they will take counter-measures. We can succeed 9 out of ten times. What about the tenth time? And how do we know it's from Iran? It has no signature. It could be from Pakistan. Iran absolutely is a threat to the U.S.

The idea that the mullahs have not made the decision to make a bomb, and if they do so we will know, is absurd. Consider all the other instances in which our intelligence was caught flat footed -- 9/11, the second Indian bomb, Pakistan, North Korea, the fall of the Soviet Union.

They could well have a bomb ready to go right now -- it's not that hard. They probably don't have the highly enriched uranium -- probably, but not definitely.

This deal makes it essentially impossible for Israel to strike -- not least because the U.S. has Israel under a microscope, by satellite and other technical means, and also with spies in the government and the IDF (Israeli Defense Force). At the first hint that a mission is imminent, the White House will leak it to the Washington Post, the New York Times, destroying operational security. Just as the U.S. leaked about Israel's strikes into Syria.

If despite this Israel tries to strike, they are the ones who will be viewed as pariahs and warmongers. They could face economic sanctions. Obviously Bibi didn't trust Obama, but Obama managed to betray him and Israel anyhow.

It's the U.S. that has the bunker buster bombs capable of taking out Iran's hardened nuclear sites, not Israel. Iran learned from Israel bombing Osirak. They distributed their nuclear program and put it in hardened sites. Israel doesn't have heavy bombers. They can't afford them; they don't have the men or the money. They rely on air superiority, which is what they've needed - F-15 and F-16s, multi-purpose aircraft.

Israeli military cooperation with the Saudis could be a game changer, because it's closer to the target and doesn't require refueling. But the Saudis don't have the necessary integrated air defenses. Is Israel going to bring in Iron Dome to protect the Saudi airfields? Iron Dome is designed for lighter, Hezb'allah missiles, and as soon as you start installing it, your secrecy is gone. Bombing Iran is not a one shot deal. Without the bunker busters, Israel is going to have to hit the same spot over and over. That is not easy. It will take 3-4 days. You bomb, evaluate the hits, bomb again in the same spot.

The bottom line is that diplomacy absolutely can't stop the Iranian nuclear project, including nuclear weapons. Diplomacy can delay the program, especially if combined with the threat of force. After we invaded Iraq, the Iranians were very scared, so they halted the project for a year. When they became convinced that we would not attack them they restarted the project and accelerated it.

The only real answer is regime change. Obama doesn't want regime change. Remember, when the protesters were in the streets of Cairo, we forced our ally Mubarak to resign, with brutal public and private pressure. But when the protesters were in the streets of Tehran, and the regime's thugs were attacking and murdering them, Obama did nothing. He could have used the occasion to tighten sanctions even more, and using the pretext of human rights he could have had European public opinion on his side.

Obama wants the Iranian regime to survive, he wants to negotiate with it, and he wants to ally with it. What a coup that would be for Mr. Obama -- he would get a second Nobel.

He is like the community organizer who goes into a rough neighborhood and wants to reach an agreement with the strongest street gang, so they will let him organize in peace. That's what Obama is doing, by bending to the Iranian demands and negotiating with Hezb'allah. Of course, this is idiotic - Hezb'allah is just a puppet of the Iranians, and only a fool would negotiate with a puppet.

Is regime change possible? The CIA could do it. We've done it before. You pay people to create labor unrest, strikes. The Iranian regime is tottering. It could be brought down. The mullahs do not trust the army. They're afraid their conscript soldiers won't fire on crowds, so they rely on Revolutionary Guards, highly paid, and on organized street thugs called the Basiji. But, you get one general to revolt and kill the political officers, make a public statement that "we must not harm the people." The Iranian people are not violent, they are not prone to riot, but a funeral leads to a demonstration, to more funerals and the protest grows. Only 55% of Iran is Persian, the rest are minorities, Arabs, Azerbaijanis -- you create problems. A truck of Iranian soldiers is blown up in the Azerbaijani region. It's not hard to do.

Iran could have a regime friendly to us. The people have experienced the mullahs; they are friendly to America, and even Israel. Under the Shah, Iran was friendly with Israel.

Obama doesn't want Iran to become an ally, or he would have acted during the Arab spring to topple the regime. They were vulnerable. The people were chanting, O ba ma, O ba ma, which means, "you are with us," in Farsi. But Obama wasn't with them.

Obama doesn't want America to have allies. He undermines them. Look what he did to Poland, our best ally in Eastern Europe. Poland went out on a limb for us on NATO missiles and Obama cut it off. He undermined Israel and the Saudis.

Anyhow, that's how I see it. If Israel had a realistic military option, they should have pulled the trigger before Obama's second term (of course, he ordered them to maintain quiet until the election was over). Don't know for sure what they were thinking. Maybe they didn't have a real option but used the threat to try to tighten sanctions and get the US to act.

It's a very bad situation -- another great mess created by our glorious leader. We're going to have a nuclear Iran.

"The only real answer is regime change. Obama doesn't want regime change. Remember, when the protesters were in the streets of Cairo, we forced our ally Mubarak to resign, with brutal public and private pressure. But when the protesters were in the streets of Tehran, and the regime's thugs were attacking and murdering them, Obama did nothing. He could have used the occasion to tighten sanctions even more, and using the pretext of human rights he could have had European public opinion on his side.

Obama wants the Iranian regime to survive, he wants to negotiate with it, and he wants to ally with it. What a coup that would be for Mr. Obama -- he would get a second Nobel.

He is like the community organizer who goes into a rough neighborhood and wants to reach an agreement with the strongest street gang, so they will let him organize in peace. That's what Obama is doing, by bending to the Iranian demands and negotiating with Hezb'allah. Of course, this is idiotic - Hezb'allah is just a puppet of the Iranians, and only a fool would negotiate with a puppet.

Is regime change possible? The CIA could do it. We've done it before. You pay people to create labor unrest, strikes. The Iranian regime is tottering. It could be brought down. The mullahs do not trust the army. They're afraid their conscript soldiers won't fire on crowds, so they rely on Revolutionary Guards, highly paid, and on organized street thugs called the Basiji. But, you get one general to revolt and kill the political officers, make a public statement that "we must not harm the people." The Iranian people are not violent, they are not prone to riot, but a funeral leads to a demonstration, to more funerals and the protest grows. Only 55% of Iran is Persian, the rest are minorities, Arabs, Azerbaijanis -- you create problems. A truck of Iranian soldiers is blown up in the Azerbaijani region. It's not hard to do.

Iran could have a regime friendly to us. The people have experienced the mullahs; they are friendly to America, and even Israel. Under the Shah, Iran was friendly with Israel.

Obama doesn't want Iran to become an ally, or he would have acted during the Arab spring to topple the regime. They were vulnerable. The people were chanting, O ba ma, O ba ma, which means, "you are with us," in Farsi. But Obama wasn't with them."

Surely we all remember how quiet Obama was during the Iranian uprising.

I watched an Abbot and Costello flick in which Costello had Abbot stuck in one of those old steam boxes where only your head poked through.Steaming the little porker, I guess.No wonder I grew up weird.

McAllister was elected in November to fulfill the unexpired term of former Rep. Rodney Alexander, who resigned to take a post in Louisana Gov. Bobby Jindal's administration. McAllister was endorsed by Phil Robertson, the "Duck Dynasty" patriarch who was caused a firestorm last year when he made some anti-gay marriage comments in an interview with GQ magazine.

"In the later stages of their film career, Abbott and Costello made numerous "monster/killer" comedies. This one is pretty good. Not on a par with the Frankenstein film but pretty good. Arthur Franz plays the invisible man seriously so the film doesn't completely fall into the silly realm.

The scenes with Costello boxing as Louie the Looper are the best. William Frawley appears, a few years away from his immortality as Fred Mertz in I Love Lucy. Anyway if you are fan of A and C, or old Universal horror movies take a look. Enjoy, but don't expect much, just relax and laugh."

As I said, Iran will go nuclear and Israel will not/cannot attack. In a thousand years from now, Obama and Haman will share a holiday.

In Gulf War I, Jewish leaders made a terrible mistake in failing to strike Iraq following the SCUD attacks. The leadership of Israel has been belled, neutered, bought off, and had. The US is not the fault, only the facilitator, going back to Eisenhower. Israel has made itself irrelevant, becoming the well behaved vassal of Assyria.

Glenn Herbert McCarthy (December 25, 1907 - December 26, 1988) was a wildcatter and a charismatic oil tycoon. The media often referred to him as "Diamond Glenn" and "The King of the Wildcatters". McCarthy was an oil prospector and entrepreneur who owned many businesses in various sectors of the economy. McCarthy founded the Shamrock Hotel in Houston, which gained him national fame and inspired the fictional character Jett Rink in Edna Ferber's 1952 novel Giant[1] along with its 1956 film adaptation, which starred James Dean in the role.Contents [hide]

McCarthy was born in Beaumont, Texas almost seven years after the discovery of oil at Spindletop. His father, Will McCarthy, worked in the oil fields and from the age of eight Glenn served the roughnecks as a waterboy for 50 cents a day.[2] During an oil drilling boom near Houston, the family relocated to the city where his father gained employment. When he was 17 Glenn enlisted in the U.S. Navy and subsequently returned to San Jacinto High School.[1][3] He attended Tulane University on a football scholarship but injured his leg. He later attended Texas A&M and Rice University before dropping out of college and venturing into business.[2] When he was 23, McCarthy married 16-year-old Faustine Lee, whose father William Lee was a partner in Yount-Lee Oil Company. McCarthy later claimed he had less than $1.50 to his name when he got married.[4]Oil[edit]

He talked his father and brother into working with him drilling for oil in Hardin County, Texas. The first attempt failed but two years later he made another attempt farther south near Anahuac and succeeded. Between 1931 and 1942 he struck oil 38 times.[4] In 1941 McCarthy bought land where the future Astrodome would be built along with 4,800 acres (19 km2) of what is now Sharpstown. During the 1940s he established 11 new oilfields and expanded several others.[2]Fame and notoriety[edit]

"Diamond Glenn" drew much attention from the national media due to his charismatic personality and his rags-to-riches story. Both loved and scorned by the media, his image formed the cultural mythos of the Texas oil millionaire: a charming, lucky, unabashed businessman. In 1949 McCarthy built the luxurious Shamrock Hotel in Houston, spending $21,000,000 for its construction. He then held what has been cited as "Houston’s biggest party" for the hotel's grand opening.[5] Dozens of Hollywood celebrities, many of whom were flown into Houston Municipal Airport on a Boeing 307 Stratoliner airplane which he had recently acquired from Howard Hughes.[6]Like most wildcatters, Glenn was an aggressive investor. His multiple ventures led to a series of financial up and downs. In 1952 a life insurance company acquired title to the Shamrock Hotel, which was then sold to the Hilton Hotels Corporation.[7] Glenn restructured his business dealings and persisted. His business holdings included KXYZ radio station in Houston, two banks, a bar, a brand of bourbon called "Wildcatter", the McCarthy Chemical Company, a magazine, 14 "throwaway" newspapers and a movie production company known as Glenn McCarthy Productions.[2] He served as chairman of the former Eastern Air Lines and president of the United States Petroleum Association.

"STORY: Hollywood Kicks Off Fundraising Frenzy for DemocratsThe event was previously scheduled for Oct. 11 at the Rosenthal home, but was canceled amid the budget crisis in Washington.Tickets for the evening event are as follows: $1,000 per guest to attend a reception with the first lady; $2,500 per couple for the reception and a photo; $4,000 per family of four for the reception and a photo; and $10,000 per guest for the reception, a photo and a roundtable discussion.For $32,400, a guest may attend all the events with the first lady, plus a special "co-chair clutch," involving a smaller number of donors."

Gossiping can have a positive impact on society by helping encourage co-operation and reform bullies, a new study found

Researchers found sharing “reputational information” could have a positive effect on society

By Miranda Prynne, News Reporter

9:58AM GMT 28 Jan 2014

Gossip can benefit society by preventing bullying and encouraging co-operation, a new study suggests.

In contrast to the conventional belief that gossip and social exclusion are malicious and should be avoided, researchers found sharing “reputational information” could have a positive effect on society.

Gossip can help social groups to reform bullies, encourages co-operation and stops “nice people” being exploited, according to the study, published in the journal Psychological Science.

Dr Matthew Feinberg, a researcher at Stanford University in the United State who co-wrote the study, said: “Groups that allow their members to gossip sustain co-operation and deter selfishness better than those that don’t.

“And groups do even better if they can gossip and ostracise untrustworthy members.

“While both of these behaviours can be misused, our findings suggest that they also serve very important functions for groups and society.”

The researchers divided 216 participants into groups and asked them to play a game which involved making financial decisions that would benefit their groups.

Before moving on to the next round with an entirely new group, people taking part could gossip about previous group members.

Future group members could then use the information to exclude, or ostracise, a suspect participant from the group before making their next financial choices.

The researchers found that when people learn about the behaviour of others through gossip, they use the information to ally themselves with those deemed co-operative.

People who have behaved selfishly can then be excluded from group activities based on the gossip.

This benefits the whole group as the more selfish types are no longer able to exploit more co-operative people for their own gains.

Doctor Robb Willer, co-author and associate professor of sociology at Stanford, said: “By removing defectors, more co-operative individuals can more freely invest in the public good without fear of exploitation.”

When people deemed selfish suffer social exclusion they often learn from the experience and reform their behaviour by co-operating more in future group settings, the team found.

Dr Willer said: “Those who do not reform their behaviour, behaving selfishly despite the risk of gossip and ostracism, tended to be targeted by other group members who took pains to tell future group members about the person's untrustworthy behaviour.

“These future groups could then detect and exclude more selfish individuals, ensuring they could avoid being taken advantage of.”

He added: “Despite negative connotations, the pairing of the capacity to gossip and to ostracise undesirable individuals from groups has a strong positive effect on co-operation levels in groups.

“I think it does speak to the mechanisms that keep people behaving honestly and generously in many settings and, where behaviour is entirely anonymous, helps explain when they don't.”

Atlanta drivers abandon cars on highway...Sleep In Grocery Stores...Snowboarding Children Attacked by Snowmen......Injuries mounting from carrots, coal used as missiles......Giant melting machines ordered from FEMA.......drudge

Since it's likely no one at this blog watched the SOTU message last night,

Fact check: Obama's State of the Union

http://www.freep.com/article/20140129/NEWS15/301290074/

Obama has likely entered the lame-duck phase of his presidency on the economy. It remains to be seen what will be accomplished on foreign policy where he has somewhat more flexibility to act on his own.

On domestic policy, the only thing that might change the equation is the 2014 election and on whether the GOP could capture the Senate as well as the House, a truly frightening prospect.

In a step that has implications for stem cell research, human biology and the treatment of disease, researchers in Japan and at Harvard University have managed to turn adult cells back into flexible stem cells without changing their DNA.

The researchers discovered that they could put cells in various challenging circumstances â?? including in acidic solutions and under physical pressure â?? and turn mature blood cells into cells that were capable of turning into virtually any cell in the body.

The research, published today in the journal Nature, was in mice. If it can be repeated in people, it has the potential to transform research using stem cells to treat disease, and it may lead to a new understanding of how the body heals from injury, said Charles Vacanti, the Harvard Medical School stem cell and tissue engineering biologist who led the research.

Biology textbooks say that once a cell matures to serve a specific role, like, say a red blood cell, it can never go back into a less mature state. Vacanti and his colleagues say their new research upends that dogma...

The GOP has talked a lot about repealing or revising Obamacare. Paul Ryan came out with a plan last year but like his initial budget proposals it was all pie in the sky generalities. However, yesterday Senators Tom Coburn, Richard Burr and Orrin Hatch came out with an alternative plan with some specifics.

Now chances are that even if the GOP were to take over the Senate this year there will be nothing that can derail Obamacare so it might be a waste of you time to even read the following so I will give you my take.

The GOP plan says if you want your old insurance system you can keep your old insurance system. While that may seem a good deal to some, the old system had plenty of flaws. The GOP system does little to change them. Likewise, for those who say the ACA is costing them more money, some estimate the GOP plan would cost them even more money.

Still, for those who just hate the ACA, the GOP proposal will likely be viewed as mana from heaven.

There are numerous articles saying much the same thing as number 1 regarding the size of the population currently working for minimum wage. It is small relative to the general population of employed. The same point was made wrt Obama's decision to up the minimum wage for federal contract workers. Most of those working for federal contractors are already making more than the minimum wage. Saw an article within the last two days (not from the Federalist) that indicated Obama's decree was likely to only hit 200,000 to 300,000 workers.

With regard to number 2, I hadn't previously really thought about what the author was specifically talking about that is unions using the minimum wage as a base to build on. I am assuming that the unions he is talking about are smaller unions. My experience is with the larger unions and usually most of those people are well beyond the minimum wage at this point. However, he is making the same point with regard to unions and the minimum wage that I was making yesterday regarding the overall effect of unions in this country. Unions have been a major factor in building up the middle class in this country in that their established wage rate set the bar for competition industry wide.

By the way, that was a nice catch yesterday on that federal spending slide. Although the info was taken from the OBM, as you pointed out the article was just written and more updated and accurate info was available. I had just breezed by the pictorial since it didn't have numbers attached. One can only assume the author was either careless and lazy or he was misleading.

Having a disagreement here with the wife about how she would like to see semi-automatic weapons banned.Because those weapons can be fitted to be fully automatic.I asked her who should have those weapons. "The military", she said."What about the police?" I questioned. "No citizen should have access to those weapons but the military," she replied.

I then asked, "What if the government wants to confiscate all of the guns?"

She brushes it aside with this, "Oh I don't foresee that happening."

What I wanted to say was, "I don't doubt that you can't foresee that, because your head is so far up Obama's ass."

I did say she was naive and she took it as me calling her stupid......Counseling, here we come!

...about 10% of all electricity generated in the U.S. came from weapons once aimed at the country. Now, after nearly 20 years, the program is coming to an end. The final shipment of Soviet-era uranium, now nuclear fuel, has arrived in Baltimore.

If there are so many folks out there unable to make ends meet on the current wage scale, how will adding an additional 11 million help?

After the first wave of the Black Death passed through 14th C. Europe, wages began to rise quickly and far above the previous rates. To halt this unholy exploitation of the economy, the elites imposed laws to fixing labor costs for each occupation. Master craftsmen responded by limiting apprenticeships and apprentice wages, pocketing the remainder. While the masters lived well, apprentices lived in harsh poverty. Since apprentices served under contract, there was no walking away from a cruel master. Because of harsh economic and contractual constraints, apprentices could not marry, which tended to reduce fertility. Journeymen fared better if for no other reason than mobility.

As an example of how the best laid plans crippled much of Europe, it was not until near the end of the 18th C that France had under cultivation pre-Plague acreage. As a parallel example, look at results of the same policies following the Justinian Plague. Government interventionist handiwork does not have an encouraging history. One thing always leads to another.

For any system to work which involves human beings, the vast majority of those humans must be conditioned over generations to follow the rules without a second thought. Trying to impose social order from above works only if the elites have the wherewithal to a) win a revolution and b) follow through with routine forays into bloodletting.

During the past century, the US has had wars against alcohol and drugs. Neither outcome was a glowing success in the realm of political science. There is now a movement to ban guns. The difference between this potential civil war is that guns shoot back at the minions of the elites. At some point, a shot will be heard around the world and all hell will break loose. You can bet your sweet bippy that dramatic change will follow.

Revolutions are unlikely to occur in the face of the overwhelming force that can immediately be brought to bear by the government at all levels. One only has to look at recent events in Boston as an example.

Besides revolution goes against the guiding principle of the sheeple, 'go along to get along' and their battle cry 'What me worry'. When a people are willing to say 'do what it takes but just protect me' there is little chance of revolution.

On the other hand, folks, I've seen q man the barricades in the world's most unlikely revolutionary situations......fighting selflessly, desperately, with no fear of death, preternatural, beyond all odds, for the sheeple and the downtrodden, the forgotten and despised of the all earth.....

In the SOTU, Obama referenced the heroism of army ranger Sgt. 1st Class Cory Remsburg who was wounded in a roadside bombing in Afghanistan on his 10th deployment. The bomb killed one and left Remsburg in a coma for three months. As he continues to struggle with his injuries, Remsburg remains a true hero.

However, there are always nuts in the media. Here is a tweet from one who compares Obama's struggles to those of Remsburg.

Mark Murray ✔ @mmurraypolitics Follow Obama's ending on Remsburg wasn't just a story about America -- it also was a story about Obama. Nothing has ever come easy

9:20 AM - 29 Jan 2014

Not ordinarily worth commenting on since you see stuff like this every day. However, in this article,

Magnificent Ronald and the Founding Fathers of al Qaeda

“These gentlemen are the moral equivalents of America’s founding fathers.” — Ronald Reagan while introducing the Mujahideen leaders to media on the White house lawns (1985). During Reagan’s 8 years in power, the CIA secretly sent billions of dollars of military aid to the mujahedeen in Afghanistan in a US-supported jihad against the Soviet Union. We repeated the insanity with ISIS against Syria.